In Electronics, there exists three distinctive areas namely discrete components or devices, circuits, and systems. A circuit is built from devices and a system is built from functional circuits such as voltage divider, amplifiers, comparators, oscillators, logic gate arrays, power supply. This invention relates in general to printed circuit boards and in particular to printed circuit boards having thereon one of said functional circuits and a interconnection pattern of circuit conductors and plated-through holes, so that a plurality of said particular printed circuit boards can be electrically connected and physically joined together on the same plane to form a systems printed-circuit board. Since each said systems printed circuit board can be used and reused according to this invention in any electronic systems, hence, the title of Universal Systems Printed Circuit Board being abbreviated as USPCB.
For the purpose of clarification and use, any person skilled in the art does know that a standard printed-circuit board shall have, as a minimum, edged copper conductors normally understood or called as printed wiring or circuit traces, edged copper pads normally called or understood as pads, and metallically plated-through apertures normally called or understood as plated-through holes. Therefore, terminologies of circuit trace(s), pad(s) and plated-through hole(s) are used hereinafter. Also, any person skilled in the art does know that a standard double-sided printed circuit board shall have as a minimum, a non-conductive substrate, a top copper-clad surface normally called or understood as upper surface or component side, and bottom copper-clad surface normally called or understood as lower surface or far-end side or circuit side. Therefore, terminologies of upper surface and lower surface are used hereinafter. Furthermore, any person skilled in the art does know that a standard multilayer printed-circuit board shall have as a minimum, an upper surface and lower surface, and two inner conductive layers being electrically isolated from each other by a non-conductive substrate. Said two inner conductive layers are normally used as a voltage plane and a ground plane. Therefore, terminologies of voltage plane and ground plane are used hereinafter.
It has been found from apparent applications and patent search that, heretofore, such a USPCB does not exist. U.S. Pat. No. 4,720,915 on Jan. 26, 1988 by Kennedy, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,325,780 on Apr. 20, 1982 by Schulz, and U.S. Pat. No. 6,226,862 on May 8, 2001 by Neuman, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,868,980 on Sep. 26, 1989 by Miller, and over 49 reference patents cited therewith all of them only relate to stand-alone printed circuit boards, i.e. printed circuit boards without a means for inter-board electrical connection on the same plane; additionally, U.S. Pat. No. 6,784,375 on Aug. 31, 2004 by Miyake, and U.S. Pat. No. 6,449,836 on Sep. 17, 2002 also by Miyake, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,950,527 on Aug. 21, 1990 by Yamada, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,832,603 on August 1974 by Cray all of them only relate to interconnecting printed circuit boards from different planes, such an interconnection method not only differs from the method used by this invention but also differs in the end use as described herein, furthermore, all of 48 reference patents being cited therewith have joined with the aforementioned 49 cited reference patents to also relate only to stand-alone printed circuit boards. Besides, none of said cited patents and reference patents mentions about a fully functional circuit being preinstalled on their related printed circuit board to play the role of a systems building block.
Particularly, the cited patent numbers U.S. Pat. No. 3,757,028 by Schlessel for a transmission line structure being printed on a circuit board with zig-zag line conductors for interference suppression, U.S. Pat. No. 6,617,521 by Saito et al. for a circuit board system connecting a semiconductor chip to a wiring board and then to a circuit board having printed input and output wirings, U.S. Pat. No. 5,039,824 by Takashima for pairs of conductor twisted between the two opposite surfaces of a circuit board to improve the transmission characteristics of the printed circuit in the high-frequency range, U.S. Pat. No. 6,423,909 by Haynie et al. for patterns of differential bus traces to interconnect electronic devices and cables together in order to mimic the size and configuration of the devices and to reduce crosstalk between channels, U.S. Pat. No. 6,423,904 by Hayami for a circuit board structured with printed wirings on both sides of the board and moving the wirings closed together with conductive blind through-hole to reduce wiring area and noise, U.S. Pat. No. 7,199,478 by Jung for a circuit board with lands patterns to improve the integration of peripheral chip mounted thereon and secure a fine soldering state, and finally, U.S. Pat. No. 4,720,915 by Kennedy for a printed circuit board preset with pre-defined pads and traces which are then re-etched and masked differently for each circuit application, are not only different in utility as compared to the invention hereunder but also different in the way the plated through holes are arranged and the printed wirings are connected. Specifically, the hole patterns and interconnection structure of this invention are aimed at interconnecting on-board discrete components to form an individual circuit board with a fully functional circuit thereon, and interconnecting the individual boards together to form a complete systems circuit board.
The printed wirings of this invention are not twisted together, or transversely moved closer by Schlessel, Haynie, or Hayami, nor connected to just a single semiconductor chip or peripheral chip by Saito and Jung. Additionally, none of the cited References provides means to cross connect circuit traces and plated through holes on the circuit board with jumping connectors.